Amuru leaders, partners move to end gender-based violence

Ms Stella Abur says her husband returned home at about 1pm one day and demanded that she prepare him food since the one that had been kept had gone cold.

Ms Abur says when she declined, he assaulted her causing a dislocation on her left leg and right arm.

Ms Abur left her matrimonial home and returned to her parents’ home. She says her parents took her to a gender-based violence (GBV) shelter run by Action Aid Uganda, a non-governmental organisation, in Otwee Parish, Amuru Town Council, Amuru District.

“The first night at the shelter was the most peaceful one in my life. That was to me, a sign of relief,” Ms Abur says.

For the three days she lived at the shelter, she received medical treatment, counselling and other psychosocial support.

While she recovered at the shelter, her husband was arrested by police for assaulting her. However, the case was forwarded to the Child and Family Protection Unit for possible mediation between the warring parties.

“At police, my husband was cautioned and he made an assurance that he would reform and never lay his hands on me,” she says.

She later returned to her matrimonial home but says though her husband no longer physically assaults her, he has now resorted to psychological torture.

“I continue to live in misery and rejection. He does not speak to me and the children, and he only provides for the family when he pleases. The responsibility of looking after the children, feeding and medical services has been left on my shoulder,” she says.

She adds that her in-laws have also labelled her a traitor for causing her husband’s arrest and detention for several days.

“I now bear a huge burden of constantly feeling guilty, especially now that my relatives and the community condemned me,” she says.

She adds: “Others now advise my husband to get married to another woman and get rid of me. The people in the neighbourhood and his brothers say I am just a woman, I should not have reported the matter.”

Ms Paska Aciro, a resident of Otwee Town Board, also says her husband assaulted her and she is now considered  a bad wife because her husband was arrested after she reported the incident to the police.

Ms Aciro adds that her in-laws and other members of the community disapproved her decision to seek  psychosocial support at the centre.

She says her husband abandoned her and their five children after he remarried in 2017 and relocated to Pabbo Sub-county in Amuru District .

“For close to eight months, my husband has not come to my house nor supported us. Initially, my brothers-in-law demanded that I leave the house for betraying their brother,” Ms Aciro says.

She adds: “One of my brothers-in-law went as far as telling me that his brother can produce other children and that my children are very useless just like me.”

Mr Julius Muganga, an evaluation officer at Action Aid Uganda, says repeated cycles of GBV in Amuru District are fuelled by poverty and the low perception the society holds of women.

“The society here still holds a very low opinion about women. There are things they believe women cannot do, and they also are reluctant to recognise the rights of women and children. We are now working with the district leadership and the police to carry out extensive sensitisation on averting the vice,” he says.

Interventions

Mr John Bosco Olum, the senior community development officer for Amuru District, says the district is working on strengthening the structures of the local councils while also engaging the traditional and cultural leaders to curb the vice.

“Survivors seek medical help usually and so we want to work with the medical facilities and health practitioners to ensure that victims of gender-based violence can get free treatment from these facilities,” Mr Olum says.

He adds that the district is working together with Action Aid Uganda to provide safe spaces for women who suffer GBV.

Last week, while speaking to media in Gulu City, Maj Gen Kahinda Otafiire, the Internal Affairs minister, said the lack of information in some cultures coupled with poverty are the key factors fuelling GBV in the region and across the country.

“If you have a society where conflict resolution is by force then there will be gender-based violence where men beat their wives and women batter their husbands. Unfortunately for the husbands, they don’t speak up because of peer pressure,” Maj Gen Otafiire says.

He says the vice had become a security issue. 

According  to the 2021 Annual Police Crime Report, Amuru District registered 434 cases of GBV, while Omoro recorded 479 cases and Agago 324.

According to the report, a total of 17,553 people were victims of GBV, 3,103 of whom were adult males, 12,877 were adult females and 871 were male juveniles and 702 were female juveniles.

About action aid shelters

Action Aid Uganda, a non-governmental organisation, established the Amuru shelter in 2014 to help the victims of gender-based violence (GBV). The organisation runs 10 GBV shelters.

The organisation works with the police to arrest and prosecute perpetrators of GBV and mediate between the victims and the abusers when they are admitted for rehabilitation and treatment at the shelter.

The Amuru shelter can only admit 10 victims at a time, according to the organisation. The shelters work through the GBV Coalition/GBV Task Force composed of technical, political and civil society representatives.

Mr Julius Muganga, an evaluation officer at Action Aid Uganda, says while at the shelter, the victims are offered safe spaces, legal, health, and psychosocial services and economic opportunities.

“These shelters offer integrated GBV services to women and girls but also men and boys as secondary beneficiaries. At the centre, temporary accommodation for protection as well as security for survivors is provided to guarantee their safety with basic necessities that include food, counselling and psychosocial support to survivors,” Mr Muganga says.